The monks of the West from St. Benedict to St. Bernard (Volume 6) online

great Apostle of the Gentiles, suddenly changed the timid
and vacillating minister of a wavering pontifi' into a bold
confessor of apostolic freedom. At the very moment when
the supreme pontificate, with its terrible responsibilities,
weighed most heavily upon him, the pontiff's soul rose to
the height of his fortunes ; the weak chancellor gave place
to the monk whom Urban II. had summoned from the
cloister to the great battles of the Church ; and the cap-
tive of Sutri desired nothing better than to give his life,
as St. Peter had done, for the defence of that Clmrch's
liberty.^

The first act of Gelasius as pope was to address a
fraternal greeting to the very Conon whom he had so
violently opposed at the Lateran Council, and whom he

now begged to continue his legation ^ until he should point
him out as the most suitable person for his successor.

The imperialists did not deceive themselves : Cencio
Frangipani, one of their leaders, when he heard of the
election, ran, sword in hand, to the church where it took
place, seized the new pope by the throat, and after having
struck and kicked him, so as to bring blood, dragged him
by the hair to his own palace, where he ordered him to be
chained.2 At these news, Peter the Prefect, Peter the son
of Leo, Stephen the Norman, and other nobles, armed them-
selves and their men, and joining the Transteverins and
all the Eoman people, hurried to deliver the pope. The
Frangipani, alarmed, hastened to release Gelasius, who was
almost immediately afterwards crowned at St. John Late-
ran.^ But the unhappy pontijBTs trials were not yet ended :
before he could be consecrated (for he was only a deacon),
he was informed one night that the emperor was within a
short distance of St. Peter's, at the head of his troops, and
ready for the attack. Gelasius rose hurriedly, and, in spite
of his great age, was flung upon a horse, and taken to the
Tiber, where he was embarked in a galley bound to Porto.
The sea was so rough at the time that it was impossible
to put out from shore without risk of perishing. The
Germans pursued the fugitives along the coast with a
shower of arrows, and threatening to set fire to the galley
if they did not immediately give up the pope.^ Night and

^ "Tanquam fratrem carissimum officiosissime salutavit." — Anon. vit.
TluoUj., loc. cit. Conon, then in Germany, asked details of the election
from the bearer of the letter, and hearing of the unanimity of the suflErage,
immediately proclaimed Gelasius.

^ He was not yet a priest, and, according to the custom of the time,
could only be ordained and consecrated at the next Ember days. — Falco
Bene v., No. inS.

■* "Imperator furtiva ct inopinata velocitate Romam vcniens." — Ep.

THE PREDECESSORS OF CALIXTUS II. 375

the storm, however, having stopped the pursuit, Cardinal
Hugh took the pope on his shoulders, and carried him
through the darkness to the castle of San Paolo at Ardea,
whence he was taken, half dead, to Terracina, and thence to
Gaeta/

So dearly did the unfortunate Gelasius pay for the pon-
tificate with which he had been invested against his will ;
and such were the sinister events which interposed between
his coronation and his consecration !

When the emperor heard that his prey had escaped him,
he again had recourse to stratagem : he invited Gelasius to
come to Rome to be consecrated, saying that he should have
much pleasure in being present at the ceremony, and so
confirming it. He added that, if Gelasius would sanction
the agreement made with Pascal, he, Henry V., would
engage immediately to swear fidelity to the pontiff; but
he also ventured to declare that, in the opposite case, he
would cause another pope to be enthroned.^

Gelasius replied that he was ready to terminate, either
by a treaty or by any just means, a quarrel which disturbed
the Church and the kingdom ; but, he added, he must defer
the affair to a future time — that is to say, to the following
St. Luke, when he should be at Milan or Cremona (cities
then in rebellion against the emperor). For the rest, before
that date, the holy Father would take council with his
brethren, whom God had made judges of the dispute.^

After this declaration, the poj)e was ordained priest and
consecrated at Gaeta, where, among other prelates, he had
been joined by the Archbishops of Capua, Benevento, and
Salerno, the Abbots of Monte Cassino and La Cava, and
the Norman princes, who all swore fidelity to him. Gelasius
then gave investiture to Duke William, in the form employed
by Gregory VII. for Robert Guiscard, grandfather of the pre-
sent prince.^ Meantime, on receiving the pontifical answer,
Henry had caused it to be read in the basilica of St. Peter.
The cunning monarch was able to avail himself, with the
Eomans, of the contempt which, he said, was shown for
Rome, in fixing the scene of the negotiation at Milan or
Cremona.^

The emperor was not attended only by soldiers ; he had
with him also Magister Guarnerius of Bologna,^ the restorer
of the science of Roman law in Italy, and several others
of those legists who are always found at the service of
oppressors of liberty and of the conscience. The mission of
these skilful men generally consisted in making long speeches
to the populace in which the ancient canons were interpreted
in a sense favourable to a new pontifical election.*

^ This famous man is found forty years later at the diet of Roncaglia,
in 1 188, where he was one of the four legists who promulgated in favour
of Frederic Barbarossa this fine maxim, " Tua voluntas jus csto : sicuii
dicitur, quidquid principi placuit legls habet vigorcm." — Otho Morena, in
Hist. rer. Laudun., ap. MURAT., loc. cit., No. 8.

Archbishop ]\Iaurice Burdin to be proclaimed pope under
the name of Gregory VIII.^ It was he who, as legate,
had betrayed Pascal II. But although the election of an
intruder was apparently popular, many of the Romans wore
distressed by a usurpation which seemed to rivet their
Church to the imperial rule ; ^ and many nobles sent word
to the pope that they had taken no part in the crime which
had placed an excommunicated man on St. Peter's throne —
that the king's criminal artifices would soon be exposed —
and that the lawful pontiff, victorious over the malice of the
schismatics, would soon be able to return to Rome.^

Gelasius hastened to denounce the sacrilegious election of
Burdin in letters addressed to the prelates and the faithful
of France, the anti-pope's native country ; after which, in
a council held at Capua, the following Easter, he excom-
municated both the emperor and the pope whom the em-
peror had enthroned.*

The council over, Gelasius, following the example of his
predecessors, retired to Monte Cassino, the cradle of his
religious life, and the citadel of his party. There the
monks received him with delight, and he obtained from

^ March lo, iiiS. Gelasius was consecrated at Capua that day or the
next. The details of the election are in Landulph., c. 32 ; the people
and a small number of clergy shared in it : " Totus popvlus . . . quidam
de indutis hahitu ccclcsiastico, . . . cum ccvtcris astantihus ckricis." Gelasius,
in his letter to the French, says that no member of the Roman clergy took
part in the election, and names only the Guibertines or the schismatics.

■* "Regem ipsum cum idolo suo excommunicavimus." — Ep. Gclas. ad
canon, in Cod. Udalr., No. 293. It is of the 13th April, and is wanting in
this collection of councils.

3/8 THE PREDECESSORS OF CALIXTUS II.

the Norman princes a promise to prosecute the war with
vigour,-^ Meantime it went on languidly on both sides,
and the emperor found himself obliged to raise the siege
of the castle of Torricella in the Abruzzi, which belonged
to the monks of Saint Andrea, This did not prevent the
monarch from being crowned by his anti-pope at Whitsun-
tide, before his return to the north of Italy, where Jordanus,
Archbishop of Milan, was carrying on a vigorous resistance.^
Gelasius, informed of the emperor's departure, returned
secretly to Rome, rather as a pilgrim than as a pontiff,^ and
hid himself in a little church near the palace of Stephen and
Pandulph, the two Normans who were of his party.* The
pope conferred with the orthodox clergy as to the means of
reducing the intruder ; but having committed the imprudence
of going to officiate for the feast of Sta Prassede,^ in the
church of that saint, he was assailed by the Frangipani. In
the midst of a bloody combat maintained by Stephen and
his nephew Crescenzio Gaetani in his defence, and in which
he was the object struggled for by both sides, he succeeded
in escaping, attracting the pity of the women who saw
him, half stripped of his sacred ornaments, and flying alone

^ See above, the council held on this subject at Milan. The church of
Ravenna, vifhich had so long been one of the centres of the imperialist
schism, and whose archbishop, Guibert, had been anti-pope, returned at
this time to orthodoxy, as is shov^n in the bull of Gelasius, which restores
to it the metropolitan rights of which Pascal II. had deprived it at the
Council of Guastalla in 1106. "Filii ipsius," says the pope in his bull of
September i, 11 18, "delicta patrum corrigere probaverunt, ut qui prse-
teritis temporibus per tyrannidem regiam prpesules regibus placentes
accipiebant, nunc demum secundum canonicas sanctiones episcopum Deo
placentem eligerent, et schismate abdicate, in catholics congregationis
gremium repedaret." — Reg. Gclas., ii. No. 4.

through the fields at his horse's utmost speed. The cross-
bearer fell while following his master. The pope was found,
worn out and weeping, in the open country, near the church
of San Paolo fuori le Mura.^ This was too much ; the
following day the venerable pontiff announced his intention
of following the example of his predecessors and leaving
that Rome which he called a Sodom and a Babylon.

" I say it before God and before the Church," he cried,
" it would be better to have one emperor than so many ;
one ill-doer would destroy those more wicked than himself,
until the Emperor of emperors should do open judgment
upon him." ^

After having intrusted the different offices of the Church
to cardinals in whom he could confide, and constituted
Stephen, the Norman hero,^ gonfalonier of the Roman
Church, Gelasius determined to visit France, as Urban II.
and Pascal 11.^ had done.

The pope went first to the two towns whose growing
power and liberty assured valuable allies to the Church,
Having left Rome by water,^ he disembarked at Pisa, the war-
like and faithful city which, obedient to the call of Victor III.
and Pascal II,, had sent its galleys by turns against the
African Saracens and the Mediterranean islanders, and which
for thirty years had maintained a perpetual crusade against

the enemies of Christ. The holy Father was received with
joy by an immense multitude gathered from the fields of
Tuscany, to whom he preached with his usual eloquence.^

Freed from the agitations of Rome, Gelasius could enjoy
the complete liberty of the pontificate,^ and he made use of
it to raise the bishopric of Pisa into a metropolitan see, with
extraordinary privileges,^ and to consecrate, in honour of
the glorious and ever-triumphant Virgin, the new cathedral,*
which the Pisans had just built from the spoils of the
Saracens. This cathedral, whose magnificence surpassed
that of any building then existing in Italy, is still standing ;
and the descendants of those who raised it see in it, with
pride, a testimony to the splendour of the Italian cities in
Catholic times.

From Pisa, the sovereign pontiff went to Genoa, which
rivalled the Tuscan city in glory, hardihood, and maritime
greatness, and there again he consecrated a cathedral in
honour of the blessed martyrs Laurence and Syr.^ There
is nothing more interesting in the general history of the
epoch than these relations of the popes with the small
municipal republics, whose infant liberties the Church en-
couraged, at the very time that she was protecting the
traditional liberties of the German princes and nobles.

^ Urban II. 's decree for this purpose had not been executed. — Pagi,
Crit., ann. 11 18, c. 11. These privileges have been confirmed and per-
petuated to our times, when the archbishop and canons of Pisa have
a ceremonial and costume almost analogous to that of the pope and
cardinals.

Council of Angoulcmc. — Councils at Dijon, Langres, and Tournus, to
which the people flock. — Monks receive Gelasius II. with great liber-
ality. — The decrees of several councils greeted with enthusiasm by
the people. — Pope Gelasius at Cluny. — War recommences between
the German princes and the emperor. — Henry V., again excommu-
nicated, returns to Germany. — Death of Gelasius II. ; election of
Calixtus II. — Confirmation, at Rome, of the election of Calixtus.
— Council of Toulouse. — General diet at Fribourg ; allocution of
William de Champeaux.— The emperor swears to respect the treaty
with the pope. — The election of Calixtus II. solemnly recognised at
Tribur. — Council of Rheims (i 119) ; the five hundred knights of Adal-
bert of Mayence. — Harangue of Cardinal Conon. — The emperor at
Mouzon. — Calixtus II. retires to a castle. — The pope issues a solemn
excommunication against the emperor. — The Truce of God again
decreed. — Hildegarde, Duchess of Aquitaine, brings before the council
her serious complaints against her husband. — Calixtus II. mediates
a peace between the Kings of France and England. — The holy Father
enthusiastically received in Italy and at Rome. — Calixtus saves the
anti-pope Burdin from his captors.

From Geneva, Gelasius turned his steps, as Urban II, and
Pascal II. had done, towards that noble country of France,
which was then the port where the storm-tossed bark of
St. Peter ever found a safe harbour.

The general state of this kingdom was then most satis-
factory. The troubles caused in a small number of the
northern towns by the institution of communes, the enter-
prises of King Louis le Gros against his great vassals —
enterprises in which the new communes, led to battle by
abbots and bishops, brought efficacious support to royalty ^

1 Order. Vital., b. xi. p. S36.
381

382 THE PREDECESSORS OF CALTXTUS II.

— even the war of Louis of France with the King of
England, and his defeat at Brenneville, in spite of the
widespread fame it had had,^ had done no serious hurt to
the liberty or salutary activity of the Church, But she
was mourning a most heavy loss, that of Yves of Chartres,^
one of the great lights of the French clergy, the friend of
Pascal II., and united by many ties of sympathy to Gelasius.
He had been quickly followed to the tomb by his friend
and faithful counsellor, Eobert d'Arbrissel,^ founder of
Fontevrault, and by Bernard of Tiron.^ These two rivals
in active holiness and sublime austerity devoted their last
efforts to the maintenance of freedom in ecclesiastical elec-
tions, endangered on the occasion of giving a successor to
Yves of Chartres.^ The object of Robert's last prayer was
to obtain from God His support for the pope and the
doctors of the Holy Church, that they might keep the good
way to the end.^ In the same year as these three great
saints, France lost a fourth, Anselm, called the doctor of
doctors^ whose father was a ploughman/ Anselm for forty

2 In January 11 17, after a pontificate of twenty-seven years, a date
carefully fixed by Pagi. St. Pius V. authorised his worship by the order
of regular canons in 1 570.

2 February 21 or 25, 11 17.

* April 25, 1117. Bernard had trained five hundred monks, three
hundred of whom he kept at Tiron, sending the two hundred others to
different places to live, twelve in each house, which he visited from time
to time. Robert had collected more than three thousand disciples of
both sexes at Fontevrault.

•'' Fleury, b. Ixvi. c. 33 and 34. Count Thibault of Blois and Chartres
would not at first recognise the election made by the canons, and seized
the property of some of them ; he resisted the persuasions of Bernard, but
yielded to Robert.

years had gathered round his chair, first at Paris, and
afterwards at Laon, a crowd of illustrious pupils from all
countries of Christendom.^ In the little town of Laon he
had established a true university, frequented by the youth
of every country in Europe.

France, in spite of these cruel losses, still possessed a
number of eminent men : Hildebert, Bishop of Le Mans ;
Geoffrey, Abbot of Vendome ; Joceran, Archbishop of Lyons;
and many other zealous prelates and learned doctors, in the
front rank of whom appeared the two legates, Gerard of
Angoulume and Guy of Vienne, who, during the last years
of Pascal II., had continued to fill with advantage to liberty,
ecclesiastical discipline, justice, and the equality of laws, the
glorious mission confided to them. Gerard was obliged to
humble Count Conon of Bretagne, who, after having robbed
the monks of Quimperle of a gift made by his ancestors,^
tried to prevent them from appealing to the Holy See.
Gerard obtained his object in a council called at Angou-
lerae,^ and which was preceded by a lively correspondence,

' July 15, 1 1 17. He trained many prelates for all countries : in Italy,
— Odalric and Anselm, both Archbishops of Milan : in Belgium, — Franco
Abbot of Lobbe ; Jean, Abbot of St. Amand ; Philippe, Abbot of Bonne-
Espdrance ; Wibald, Abbot of Stevelot ; Bernard, Bishop of Utrecht : in
England, — William and Ralph, Archbishops of Canterbury ; the Bishops
of Hereford, Rochester, and London, and Abbot Gilbert of Sempringham,
founder of the order which bears his name : in Germany, — the B. Dittmar,
schoolmaster of Bremen ; Idunge of Ratisbon, a celebrated writer ; B,
Wecelin of Oldenburg, and Apostle of Holstein : in France, — Raoul, his
brother and successor as teacher at Laon ; St. Bruno, Mathieu of Laon,
Cardinal-bishop of Albano ; Hugh Melet, Abbot of St. Leon of Toul ;
Gilbert de la Porroe, and William de Champeaux ; Raoul Levert, Arch-
bishop of Rheims ; Geoffrey Ic Breton and Hugh d' Amiens, Archbishops
of Rouen ; Bishops of Coutances and Lo Mans : and, finally, Abolard (who
speaks ill of them), — were all trained in the schools of Anselm. — Hist. litt.
dc Prance, vol. x. 173, and Devisme, Hist, de Laon, vol. i. p. 231. This
enumeration, though very incomplete, shows the unity and activity of